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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25694983">four leaf clover</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/vicari_us/pseuds/vicari_us'>vicari_us</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Haikyuu!!</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Character Study, Chronic Pain, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Sakusa Kiyoomi-centric, analysis of the itachiyama banner, atsumu accidentally being insensitive, atsumu redeeming himself, descriptions of hypermobility, Перевод на русский | Translation in Russian</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 10:40:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,973</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25694983</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/vicari_us/pseuds/vicari_us</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>Once, Ushijima claimed that they ‘got lucky’. If properly honed, their body types could become near invincible weapons.</p>
  <p>However, unlike Ushijima, Kiyoomi’s weapon required a bit more care over the years to reach the condition it had become. He was born iron, not yet forged into steel.</p>
</blockquote>Exploring what it might have taken to turn a genetic mistake into an athletic miracle.
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>792</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>SakuAtsu Fics</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>four leaf clover</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>We all love the bendy wrists, the Sakusa flop. However, I wanted to explore what difficulties Sakusa may have faced with his hypermobility over his lifetime and career. Also featuring another take on the roots of his mysophobia.</p>
<p>If discussions of character injury/illness could make you uncomfortable, please be cautious.</p>
<p>(w/ thanks to Nine for the beta, and Mika, Tess, Syirah, and Lou in particular for enabling and tolerating my agenda, you’re the real MVPs)</p>
<p>
  <strong>Now available in Russian <a href="https://ficbook.net/readfic/10230789/26325339">here!</a> Massive thanks to the lovely <a href="https://twitter.com/oikawatorujapon">Alex</a> for the translation.</strong>
</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>'Effort'— a vigorous or determined attempt; strenuous physical or mental exertion. Kiyoomi was very familiar with the term and its uses.</p>
<p>‘Effort’ hung behind him at every match he played for three years, neatly summarising the common purpose of the team on the court below. He always admired the clean simplicity of their team motto and the attitude it represented: a constant push towards self-improvement, team improvement, a push towards victory and all of its glory; all in two short syllables. Itachiyama Academy reigned as the champions of Tokyo due to the sheer amount of effort their volleyball team put in year after year, Kiyoomi included. His own particular brand of effort was recognised in his position as one of the top three aces in the country by his second year of highschool, something almost unheard of. Kiryuu and Ushijima were third years with incredible strength and tenacity just like his own, but it was Kiyoomi’s flexibility that set him apart from them.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi could relate to Ushijima to an extent. His left-handedness couldn’t have been easy to come to terms with, considering the negative light such a preference was perceived in a lot of the world. He admired the skill Ushijima had developed in spite of it, and considered him both a kindred spirit and an honourable rival. Ushijima was another ‘freak of nature’ who had ignored the whispers surrounding him and climbed his way to the top regardless. Ushijima inspired him to work harder, to do better.</p>
<p>Once, Ushijima claimed that he ‘got lucky’. Kiyoomi immediately understood. If properly honed, their body types could become near invincible weapons. Ushijima was known as a cannon, while Kiyoomi felt that his weapon resembled something more like a flail. His arm was the sturdy handle to provide power and stability, his wrist the flexible chain, his hand the lethal striking head. Ushijima blasted through blockers and receivers alike; Kiyoomi would strike around the shields in front of him and revel in how they found themselves tangled in his chain. However, unlike Ushijima, Kiyoomi’s weapon required a bit more care over the years to reach the condition it had become. He was born iron, not yet forged into steel.</p>
<p>Pride was the primary emotion he felt regarding his status. He was proud that just like Ushijima, he had turned what could have been his greatest weakness into his ultimate strength. He was proud that he was no longer looked down upon with pity and disgust, instead watched with eyes brimming with awe and respect. Although, hiding behind the swell of pride in his heart whenever someone commented on his wicked spikes was deep-rooted frustration. Frustration with himself, frustration with others. When onlookers would praise him for his ‘freaky spin’, it would bring bubbles of irritation up his throat to get stuck there and choke him before he snapped to correct them. His skill was not his spin—his skill was <em>controlling</em> it. Just like receivers had to work to get used to the angles his spikes could shoot off at, so did he. It had taken years of hard work, years of <em>effort</em>, to be able to utilise his broken joints in a way that was effective.</p>
<p>As a child, showing off the extreme range of motion his wrists in particular could produce was easy entertainment. Komori and his friends would be simultaneously concerned and amazed by the party tricks he could do, contorting his body into shapes that would be agony for anyone else. Sometimes, they would try to copy him. Every time, they would find themselves regretting it.</p>
<p>As a teenager, it started to become less entertaining. Whenever he found himself with a day off from volleyball, his joints would seize up and bring him unbearable pain. Regular exercise—<em>try yoga!</em>—was recommended by the dismissive doctor his older brother took him to see one day, so he concluded that he just wasn’t built for time off. He threw himself into practice every day without fail, running through drill after drill, taking out his frustration on the ball in front of him, hoping that one day, he could let go of the obligation. Hoping that one day it would just feel good, nothing more. When that day came, he decided, he would be finally finished with his task.</p>
<p>Constant practice kept his pain in check for the most part, but exhausted him beyond belief. It got to the point where he wished he could tolerate coffee, just so that he had even an iota of energy left after school and practice to find a hobby. He started to notice dark bags growing under his eyes no matter how much sleep he got or how many different pots and tubes of cream he emptied. It truly added insult to injury, but at least his picky teenage skin was clear, he supposed.</p>
<p>To his teammates, his condition was irrelevant until they played and it could be useful. His coach had pulled him aside one day to ask him if he was seeing a physiotherapist yet, but Kiyoomi didn’t quite see the point. After all, if he had volleyball now, what more could he need? Coach had looked down at him with an expression that made his blood boil and his fists clench, and he excused himself with a short bow. The next ball he hit spun and bounced from the red, raw skin of Komori’s forearms. Finally—<em>finally</em>—it flew straight up in the air in a graceful parabola.</p>
<p>The fourth doctor he saw informed Kiyoomi that he was ‘hypermobile’. Kiyoomi thought the word was rather self-explanatory, but when the man explained that being bendy might not be the only thing unique about him, he listened. The doctor admitted he didn’t know too much about his condition, but handed him a scrap of office paper with the title of a book scrawled in stereotypically abysmal handwriting instead.</p>
<p>“Read it,” the kind doctor told him. “You might be surprised by what you learn about yourself.”</p>
<p>The book gathered dust on Kiyoomi’s bookshelf until one day, he managed to twist his ankle on flat concrete walking home from school. He felt like a puppet severed from its strings. The impact of his ankle hitting the pavement had jarred his knee and pulled muscles he didn’t even know he had, but he had no choice but to grit his teeth and hobble home. His house was empty as always when he arrived, so he headed to the freezer to strap an ice pack to the swelling of his foot and settled down at his desk. The pristine cover of the spiral-bound book stared at him until he opened it as he prodded at the violet bruise blooming on his ankle.</p>
<p>Apparently, a lot of things about him weren’t normal.</p>
<p>It should have been a revelation, but for some reason it felt more like switching on a lamp at the end of the day, rather than watching storm clouds parting to reveal the sun.</p>
<p>From that point onwards, he took care of his health in a way that bordered on obsessive. He was already starting to fall apart at the seams; he couldn’t afford to make it any worse. A surgical mask covering his face any time he left the house became part of his daily routine, along with frequent, thorough hand-washing and the avoidance of busy crowds. Who knew what others could be carrying? Who knew how long their dirt and disease would wreak havoc on his fickle body? The alcoholic burn in his nostrils from the hand sanitiser he carried with him everywhere became a familiar comfort. A comfort, <em>not</em> a crutch. He had no need for crutches.</p>
<p>He had just turned seventeen when he rolled over in bed and his collarbone slipped out of its socket for the first time. By the time he was eighteen, he’d dislocated both of his thumbs more times than he could count. He pushed his bones back in when nobody was looking, and pushed on. The physiotherapist he started seeing was impressed by how well he’d managed his condition, but invited him back for weekly sessions to strengthen the parts of his body that volleyball didn’t. He grew taller, grew broader. Stretch marks littered his skin. Eventually, the marionette strings that had been cut that day years ago were repaired, one by one.</p><hr/>
<p>From university, the finer details of his condition were only shared with those who needed to know—namely his coaches at school, then at the Jackals. He wasn’t ashamed of it, per se. It was just more irritating than anything to have to explain to anyone who saw the flick of his wrists that they should mind their own business rather than asking ‘what was wrong’ with him. Nothing was wrong with him, even when he chose to wear bandages and braces to support his plays. He was born this way, so how could anything be wrong?</p>
<p>He wasn’t defined by his body; it was only part of him, and he part of it. He was now the only force capable of manipulating his body’s strings, nobody—or nothing—else. At least that was what he told himself.</p>
<p>It was a rainy Tuesday in February when a stranger in the supermarket cereal aisle sneezed a cloud of droplets into his face. His feet glued themselves to the floor, body and mind torn between ripping the ugly, disgusting, selfish head off of the man’s shoulders, and sprinting to the nearest bathroom to scrub his face raw. The man took one look up at the growing storm on his face and ducked into a deeply apologetic bow, but the damage was already done. Five days later, Kiyoomi cringed at the 38.4℃ blinking on his thermometer and settled down in his bedroom to sniffle and suffer. Komori dropped by every few days to check in on him despite Kiyoomi’s protests. He didn't need his pity, get <em>out</em>, he told him, over and over. Accepting help wasn’t a sign of weakness, Komori insisted.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi took that bitter pill into his mouth but refused to swallow. If it weren’t for the miniscule mutation present in every cell in his body, he knew he would be stronger. If he were just <em>normal</em>, he wouldn’t have to ask for help because he wouldn’t require it. He wouldn’t have to avoid crowds like the literal plague, he wouldn’t have to make every morsel of food that entered his mouth from scratch, he wouldn’t have to put in so much fucking energy into micromanaging every element of his entire life every single day. He might have even found himself as a player at the top of the rankings from his efforts alone like Kiryuu, no ‘fortune’ required.</p>
<p>What then? Who could he have become, if he were born without genetic building blocks that refused to hold him together?</p>
<p>KT tape left weeping pink blisters and tears in his skin, support bandages cut off circulation, and braces slipped and slid around as he moved during the day. No matter what option he chose, there was no winning solution. He found himself wrangling the velcro straps of a wrist brace in the Jackals’ locker room one day in the spring, getting more and more annoyed when the stupid thing just wouldn’t stay stuck down no matter how hard he tried. The tiny loops were fluffy and frizzy from the amount of times he’d ripped the thing off at the end of the day, even when he did so with care. A short cough interrupted his struggle, and he looked up with a glare.</p>
<p>Atsumu stood a few feet away from him, looking mildly amused. “Need a hand, Omi-kun? Y’know, since one of yours is outta commission.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi scowled harder, bringing his arm down to hold it behind his back. “Hilarious, and no.”</p>
<p>Atsumu laughed at his own joke since nobody else would have. “Jeez, cold as always. Look, yer obviously havin’ a tough time, and I had one of those shitty things for a while when ‘Samu tripped me up as a kid.”</p>
<p>“I’m not a kid.”</p>
<p>“I never said ya were. There’s just a knack to it when it gets all battered like that, no matter how old ya are,” Atsumu stepped forward and held out his hand. Kiyoomi took a longer step back. “Here.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi hesitated, clenching his fist behind the thick fabric. Atsumu waited patiently, hand still open and outstretched. “Why are you doing this?”</p>
<p>“Is it really that hard to imagine I just wanna help ya out?” Atsumu asked.</p>
<p>“Yes, and I don’t need your help. I’m fine.”</p>
<p>A sigh and a beckoning motion. “Just gimme yer damn hand. I won’t touch ya, I promise. Just the brace.”</p>
<p>Something in Atsumu’s expression had Kiyoomi lower his guard by a few crucial millimetres. He took his left hand from behind his back and placed it in the other’s palm, Atsumu careful to keep his fingertips only in contact with fabric. His other hand came up to undo the peeling velcro and stick it back down firmly.</p>
<p>“Ya gotta do this to really help it stick when it’s all fuzzy,” he explained. He held Kiyoomi’s wrist in one hand, and used the other to put pressure on and rub his fingers back and forth over the strap closest to his hand. A few seconds later, he repeated the motion on the one further down his forearm. When he was done, he gave the brace a little pat and let go. Kiyoomi withdrew his hand and flexed his fingers, pleased to see that the brace was secure.</p>
<p>“Thanks, I guess,” he mumbled, adjusting the fit a little more.</p>
<p>Atsumu frowned, folding his arms across his chest. “‘I guess’? What, ya want me to kiss it better an’ all? Ungrateful bastard.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi rolled his eyes and ignored the comment. He also pointedly ignored the weight lifting from his shoulders.</p>
<p>Miya Atsumu was a curious man in more ways than one. He was also a man rude enough to voice his curiosities whenever they popped into his head.</p>
<p>Over the years, he’d asked Kiyoomi various probing questions about him and his condition; <em>what did ya do to yer knee this time, how d’ya even spike like that, whoa, can ya do the splits?</em> His questions were a nuisance, but never intentionally hurtful. When Atsumu had first experienced the rumoured flexibility in person, he’d simply stared across the net with some kind of hunger in his eyes. Atsumu had never questioned his skill, claimed he was ‘cheating’, nor shown any kind of discomfort when faced with what Kiyoomi’s body could do. He simply seemed fascinated by the unique challenge he posed as an opponent, then later, as a teammate.</p>
<p>As a setter for the Jackals, Atsumu was surrounded by unique challenges on his own side of the net. He was truly in his element on the court. He was the conductor to their unlikely choir, keeping every player in harmony. His tosses were tailored to each spiker, allowing them to maximise and capitalise on their individuality.</p>
<p>It took a long time, but Kiyoomi learned to stop doubting the sets sent his way. They would sing <em>trust me, I’ve got this</em>, and he eventually believed them. Kiyoomi didn’t worry any more that the ball would be too high, force him to jump beyond his carefully defined limits, and risk a dangerous landing. Atsumu’s role required him to enjoy being the one pulling the strings, and sometimes, Kiyoomi allowed himself to hand them over.</p>
<p>His physiotherapist was one of the only people Kiyoomi trusted with his body in their hands. He felt something slip low in his back after standing up from a crouch in his bathroom on yet another damn Tuesday, and she informed him the next day that it was his pelvis. From that point onwards, the twinge of pain associated with the slip became irritatingly familiar. A loud <em>pop</em> sounded when he shoved his bones back into place yet again with a sudden backbend at practice, and both Atsumu and Bokuto turned to stare in unison at the sound.</p>
<p>Bokuto whistled. “Wow, satisfying. Standing next to you is like watching one of those chiropractor ASMR videos!”</p>
<p>“What even was that? Ya sounded like a damn burst balloon,” Atsumu added, eyebrows raised.</p>
<p>Bokuto burst out into boisterous laughter while Kiyoomi refused to answer, rubbing at the still tender spot around his tailbone. He caught Atsumu staring with something dangerously close to concern written in the lines of his face. “My ass isn’t going to disappear, Miya. You can look away from it for a moment.”</p>
<p>The flush on Atsumu’s face as he ripped his gaze away would have made Kiyoomi join Bokuto in his howling if he were anybody else. Instead, he settled on a small smirk that made the pink tips of Atsumu’s ears almost glow.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi liked to prepare for the worst in life, of others, and of himself. In volleyball, victory was the ultimate goal. The satisfaction of painting the sideline one final time, or better yet, slamming one last spiralling spike into an open gap left by exhausted opponents, watching them dive and fall to no avail, shrill whistle proclaiming the winners and losers of the hour. Of course Kiyoomi expected to win each match he played, but to him, it wasn’t the point. He just wanted to see things through to the end, whatever that end might be. He would do what he could and what needed to be done, but there were variables he couldn’t control no matter how hard he tried. Preparation didn’t make him a pessimist, no matter what Komori liked to say. As long as he was prepared, he could never be disappointed.</p>
<p>He thought he was prepared for the impact of Hinata’s body against his as they attempted to block one of Barnes’ spikes in a 3-on-3. He was wrong, finding himself tumbling to the ground with a thump and a hiss from the sheer force behind Hinata’s jump. He felt the grinding pain of his left shoulder being knocked out of place and sat up with his arm hanging limply in his lap, agony excruciatingly normal.</p>
<p>Hinata dropped to his knees beside him, shouting rapid-fire apologies that did more to annoy Kiyoomi than soothe him. Bokuto, Barnes, and Inunaki had frozen with expressions in various degrees of shock, while Kiyoomi heard Atsumu’s voice calling for their coach as he dipped under the net.</p>
<p>It was embarrassing, more than anything. He should’ve known better, thought his actions through in full. The heat and the glare of a spotlight was tolerable when required, but only when he could decide what aspects of him it illuminated. <em>Nobody can be prepared for everything, stop putting yourself down</em>, Komori’s voice told him in his head.</p>
<p>He ignored the questions buzzing in his ears, sucking in a deep breath through his nose to lift and reset the dislocation with a grunt and a loud <em>crunch</em>. Normal feeling returned to the limb with a wave of tingling pins and needles, and he rotated his shoulder, flexing his fingers to make sure everything was where it should be. No permanent damage, maybe a bruise tomorrow at most. Good.</p>
<p>When he looked up, it was to silence. He found himself missing the usual chaos of the gym for the first, and hopefully last, time in his life.</p>
<p>Atsumu was waiting for him in the corridor when Kiyoomi finally left their coach’s office with futile instructions to rest. He stood with his back and a foot against the wall, obviously trying to look nonchalant while tapping away on his phone. Kiyoomi sighed behind his mask.</p>
<p>Atsumu jumped and shoved his phone into the pocket of his shorts. He looked up with a too-bright grin and a cheery wave and Kiyoomi regretted acknowledging him at all.</p>
<p>“Ah, Omi-kun! Beautiful evenin’, dontcha think?” Atsumu commented, falling into step next to him.</p>
<p>Their footsteps echoed in sync from the empty corridor walls. “It would be better if you got to the point quickly.”</p>
<p>Atsumu twitched and clicked his tongue against his teeth. “Who says there’s a hidden agenda? Maybe I just wanted to ask if ya wanted to watch the sunset with me.” At Kiyoomi’s dark stare, he laughed and held up his hands. “Alright, fine. I wanted to make sure ya were okay after, y’know. Whatever the hell <em>that</em> was.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi snorted and pushed open a door with his right hand tucked into his sleeve. Atsumu unfortunately caught it before it could hit him in the nose. “You mean you wanted to find out what ‘that’ was.”</p>
<p>“Well, that too,” Atsumu admitted. “Ain’t often ya see someone reset their own dislocation outside of a movie.”</p>
<p>The dull ache in Kiyoomi’s shoulder throbbed. He rolled it again, stepping through the automatic doors into the sticky summer night. Atsumu sat down on a bollard as Kiyoomi watched him out of the corner of his eye. “I’m used to it.”</p>
<p>Atsumu scoffed. “Yeah, clearly. But why? Ya shouldn’t be used to things that.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi didn’t particularly mind showing people his party tricks, either on purpose or by accident. Talking about it, explaining the domino effect from one faulty gene to each of his joints being held together by elastic rather than steel—that was something else entirely.</p>
<p>He settled on a small shrug. “It happens most days. I play just fine, don’t I?”</p>
<p>In his periphery, Atsumu looked <em>appalled.</em> His eyebrows were pushed together and up towards his hairline, eyes wide, the corners of his open mouth curled downwards. Kiyoomi should’ve been used to that expression turned on him by now, but he didn’t think he’d ever learn to bear it. Any other day, it would have pissed him off at the very least. That day, he barely had the energy left to react at all.</p>
<p>The sunset he was promised was mediocre at best. Most of the light was already obscured by heavy, swollen clouds, threatening to burst into an August storm. Kiyoomi’s t-shirt stuck to his back in the humid air, and his hair clung to the beads of sweat already gathering at his nape. The simultaneous chirping of thousands of cicadas droned on, a relentless whine that buzzed harshly against his eardrums.</p>
<p>It would have reminded him of Atsumu, had the man not been sat next to him, still completely mute.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi leaned back against the cool glass of the window behind him. His mask felt stifling against his face, the recycled air choking him. “I have a condition. I was born with it and I manage it, like you all saw. I don’t like talking about it.”</p>
<p>“Does it have anythin’ to do with the mask?” Atsumu asked. Kiyoomi nodded, “The spin?” Another nod.</p>
<p>Atsumu fiddled with the cords hanging from the waistband of his shorts. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”</p>
<p>A smaller nod. “Sometimes. Mostly, I’m just tired.”</p>
<p>“I’ll bet,” Atsumu murmured. He swung his backpack from his shoulders and began rummaging through it, tongue sticking out from between his teeth. After a moment, he pulled out a small battered box and gestured for Kiyoomi to take it.</p>
<p>When he read the printed label, he couldn’t help the confusion that creased his brow. “Ibuprofen? You really think I haven’t already taken some?”</p>
<p>Atsumu spluttered, his words coming out even more accented than usual in his embarrassment. “Shaddup, s’good to have extra, y’know?”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi chose not to mention that he already had seven packets at home, and slipped the box into his pocket.</p>
<p>“Miya,” he said. Atsumu looked up and held his gaze. “I’m not made of glass.”</p>
<p>For some reason, he tipped his head back and laughed. “I could never think ya were, Omi-kun.”</p>
<p>Nobody walked on eggshells around Kiyoomi when he rejoined practice the next week. Bokuto still slapped him hard between the shoulders no matter how quickly he tried to duck away, Hinata still clung to his sleeve and begged him to give him more spikes to receive. Kiyoomi tried to palm him off on Barnes—<em>but Omi-senpai, your spikes are the coolest!</em>—and failed.</p>
<p>He didn’t know why he expected Atsumu to behave differently, but he didn’t. Atsumu was as precise, aggressive, and experimental as ever, not a second wasted on hesitation or reflection. He continued to slowly raise the bar for each of his spikers, as far as he knew they could reach. Atsumu didn’t bother to prepare for the worst, because he simply expected the best and wouldn’t allow anything less. His plays would warn you that <em>ya’d better nail this one, </em>and when you did, tell you smugly that <em>I knew ya could do it</em>. That pressure was still on despite Kiyoomi publicly falling apart less than a week prior, and while he was grateful for it, the sensation still left him feeling somewhat off-balance.</p>
<p>He had planned to have to defend himself from thinly veiled pity, to bat away questions and comments of well-intentioned but misinformed reassurance. None came. His team saw him enter the gym that day with his usual composure, and accepted it at face value. Kiyoomi knew that if he was on the court, he could play just fine. They never doubted that either, it seemed.</p>
<p>But what was he to do when his preparations were for naught? He accepted their acceptance with silent gratitude, but still felt like he was missing something. Keeping his distance from people kept him safe, it always had. Distance was for the sake of his health, both physically and emotionally. Why did their easy understanding feel like validation, and why did he care anyway?</p>
<p>He thought of the fuzzy wrist brace he’d finally mastered the application of, and the crumpled blister pack of pills in his bag that were most definitely prescribed to one Miya Osamu, not Atsumu.</p>
<p>This time, Kiyoomi was the one to catch Atsumu under the shelter of the gym entrance. The sun was still lingering just above the horizon, reflecting in bands off the steel and glass of the building, but the air was just as thick and oppressive as the week before.</p>
<p>“Ya were really on form today, Omi-kun,” Atsumu commented, the door sliding shut behind him with a click.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi was caught off-guard by the sudden compliment. “What did you expect?”</p>
<p>“If yer implyin’ I was expectin’ ya to limp and whine all over the court, ya’d be wrong,” Atsumu’s eyes seemed to glint a dangerous gold in the low light. “I trust ya more than that, and I hoped ya’d trust me more, too.”</p>
<p>Silence blanketed them as he observed Kiyoomi’s reaction. He made sure Atsumu didn’t get much of one, despite the uncomfortable twist in his gut. “Did you tell them anything we talked about?”</p>
<p>Atsumu shook his head. “Didn’t have to say a word. Hinata was freakin’ out like he’d killed ya, but Coach sat him down and told him not to worry. I heard him and Bokkun talkin’ about givin’ ya a call, but Hinata said somethin’ wise about ‘boundaries’ and that was that.”</p>
<p>Something must have shown on his face, because Atsumu cracked a smile. “Even if yer a massive asshole and yer body’s all fucked up and weird, people care about ya, Omi-kun.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi folded his arms across his chest and frowned. “My body isn’t ‘fucked up and weird’, Miya.”</p>
<p>“<em>That’s</em> the part ya focus on?” Atsumu said, exasperated. “Doesn’t matter what ya call it, yer not normal, just like the rest of us. Ya should be proud of it.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi was tempted to be pedantic and point out that there was a difference between not being normal and being ‘fucked up’, but decided that it wasn’t worth the trouble.</p>
<p><em>Just like the rest of us</em>—Atsumu said it so casually, like he’d thought it before. Like he’d already thought of Kiyoomi as something akin to him and them, rather than the ‘other’ he’d always felt and tried to make himself be. It was strange to feel both humbled and insulted by the idea of being compared to Atsumu.</p>
<p>He wasn’t wrong though, was he? They were known as members of the ‘Monster Generation’; those who had fought tooth and nail to perform to the best of their ability at the top of the world. Kiyoomi may have felt he walked a different path to get there, but their destination was the same. He thought to himself on a regular basis that his teammates were truly freaks of nature, but it always takes one to know one, after all.</p>
<p>“I’ve always been proud,” he said. “Not because of my body, but because of how I’ve learned to use it."</p>
<p>Atsumu hummed in agreement, jangling a set of keys in his pocket. “Kita-san ain’t too fond of the word ‘genius’. He thinks it’s rude, y’know? Invalidates the hard work anyone good enough to be scared of must’ve put in over the years, or somethin’.”</p>
<p>Kiyoomi had to avert his eyes from the small smile that put the sunset to shame.</p>
<p>“I think we’d get along.”</p><hr/>
<p>Neither of them knew for sure when they officially started dating, as much as Kiyoomi hated to admit it. Atsumu insisted it was the day of their first kiss, but it couldn’t have been. Back then he wasn’t ‘Atsumu’ yet, still just ‘Miya’.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi was convinced that it was at some point after they finally went on a real date, and somewhere before he had two toothbrushes in his bathroom and several t-shirts that were slightly too tight across the shoulders in his wardrobe. The uncertainty still irked him, but a year down the line it didn’t really matter too much anymore.</p>
<p>Atsumu had once proposed the idea of moving in together over a gluten-free pizza they both agreed tasted like sawdust, and was immediately shot down. Kiyoomi liked his own space, his own routines, his own home. He liked being able to open the door to his apartment and find it exactly how he left it; to hang his coat, draw his curtains, and curl up in bed on those days the mere thought of speaking another word would drain him. Atsumu liked listening to music without headphones well into unsociable hours, and stealing the duvet every night without fail. Kiyoomi learned that he ground his teeth loud enough ‘to wake the fuckin’ dead’, that Atsumu insisted that expired yoghurt was safe to eat, that Kiyoomi’s habit of reorganising the shelves in Atsumu’s fridge by produce type drove the man mad.</p>
<p>After several fights and weeks of near endless bickering, they found a balance where their homes were each other’s, but still their own.</p>
<p>As weeks turned into months, Kiyoomi found himself opening up more than he ever expected. Sometimes it would be an explosion in the middle of an argument when Atsumu unwittingly stepped on a landmine, others a whisper into the warm skin of a human furnace under the safety of dimmed lights. At first he was either tricked or physically dragged to team get-togethers after practice, on the weekends, before practice. Being nicknamed a ‘package deal’ by Inunaki ended with him showing up even when Atsumu was busy out of spite. Although, every once in a while, he allowed himself to relax within the company of his teammates. His mask always hid his rare smiles and quiet laughter, but the carefully defined distance he once kept between them shrank to something still comfortable, yet new.</p>
<p>Once, Atsumu had said he thought Kiyoomi trusted him and met a brick wall. Back then, he only truly trusted him within the set boundaries of the court. Over time, Atsumu dismantled that wall brick by brick. He took it apart with brutal observations, said so casually that he knew they would play on Kiyoomi’s mind until he learned from them. He broke it down with gentle touches Kiyoomi didn’t know he needed until Atsumu’s hands were already there.</p>
<p>Even if he lied about what happened to Kiyoomi’s favourite pair of gloves, he only gave him the honest truth when it mattered. When Kiyoomi winced when one of his knees buckled at the genkan, Atsumu bent down and untied his shoelaces for him, already talking about how the weather was shitty anyway and staying in that night was for the best. Kiyoomi tried to bat him away and argue, but he looked up with determination in his eyes.</p>
<p>“D’ya really think the effort of goin’ out tonight is worth how yer gonna feel tomorrow?” he asked from between Kiyoomi’s feet. His tone gave Kiyoomi the impression that he already knew the answer.</p>
<p>Their shoes stayed neatly paired in the doorway, and Kiyoomi spent the evening carding his fingers through bleach blonde hair to the sound of a movie Atsumu adored and the raindrops rolling down his fogged up windows. Atsumu turned his head in Kiyoomi’s lap to drop kisses along his knuckles, and he didn’t feel so weak anymore.</p>
<p>They tolerated each other at worst, and loved each other at best—in sickness, and in health. Atsumu was never his caretaker; he wasn’t capable of such a thing, and Kiyoomi would never even let him try. They simply stood side by side, and whenever either of them needed a hand to pull them up from the hole they’d dug themselves into, they were ready to offer one.</p>
<p>When the invitations to join the National Team arrived, Kiyoomi held his letter between shaking fingertips. His physiotherapist skimmed over it through the bottle-bottom lenses of her glasses, placing it gently back onto her desk to give him the most genuine words of congratulations he’d ever heard. Atsumu crushed him in his arms when he stepped out of her office, stunning him into silence with the pure joy whispered into the shell of his ear.</p>
<p>Kiyoomi found it difficult to put into words how his pride had changed over the years, so he didn’t—at least not out loud. It was the same at its core, but wearing the red jersey with ‘Japan’ over his heart and his name emblazoned across his shoulders added so many more nameless emotions to the tangled mess he would one day work to unravel. When a faceless reporter asked him what he was enthusiastic about as a representative, he didn’t even have to stop to think.</p>
<p>“I’ll do what I can,” he told her. She looked at him oddly, nodding and scribbling in her notepad anyway. He didn’t really care to elaborate. He and his teammates knew what he meant, and that was what mattered.</p>
<p>There was no cure or treatment for his condition, his book told him, now dog-eared and worn. Managing the symptoms was the only way to move forward. Every week he would greet his physiotherapist with a bow and depart with another, an ache present in his muscles that gave him faith that he would be able to do it all again and again for years to come.</p>
<p>He knew that one day his body would define the end of his career, but that was the same for everyone, wasn’t it? He didn’t feel bitter about the body he’d been given anymore; that conflict was over. He was finally proud of it as well as himself, because his broken body was what had carried him to the finish line—to a place that while painful, still felt good.</p>
<p>He was different, but that didn’t mean he was alone. Sometimes, he had no choice but to be vulnerable. Vulnerable with Atsumu, with his doctors, with his team, with himself. But as he stepped onto the court he’d made his home one more time and the spotlights above shone brightly onto all facets of him, the vulnerabilities they illuminated were his greatest pride.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Essentially, this was one big piece summarised by me reaching for representation. Seeing a character with a body like mine reach success and 'feel good' somewhere gives me a lot of feelings, and hopefully any readers with an experience of chronic pain/illness can take something away from this too.</p>
<p>Hypermobility and the things associated with it can be fun sometimes, but not always! I hope I managed to get this across.</p>
<p>If you'd like to learn more about conditions associated with hypermobility, please take a look at the <a href="https://www.ehlers-danlos.com/">Ehlers-Danlos Society</a> and the <a href="https://www.hypermobility.org/">Hypermobility Syndromes Association</a> websites.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for reading, and I appreciate any and all feedback!</p>
<p> </p>
<p>  <a href="https://twitter.com/vicari_us">Twitter</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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